California candidate vows Office of Fun and Freedom to cut red tape

California should be the most fun place in America.

Look at what we have. Beaches, lakes, mountains, parks, incredible weather, great food and music, and people from every part of the world. It should be almost impossible to make California boring.

But the politicians and bureaucrats who run our state are doing their best!

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California was not built by killjoys. It became the world’s great magnet for artists, inventors, rebels and misfits because this was the place you came to create, experiment and live freely.

Try doing something fun today.

Want to put on a band at a small venue? You can end up dealing with separate rules for entertainment, dancing, sound, alcohol and zoning. Want to organize a block party? Get ready to deal with police, fire, health, public works and alcohol officials. Want to take your dog to the beach, gather your family around a firepit or turn a vacant storefront into a neighborhood meeting place? The answer from the killjoy bureaucrats: No, No, No.

Or…maybe, but only once you’ve spent months — and thousands of dollars — proving that your harmless idea should be allowed.

How did we get here? It wasn’t one law or one decision. The rules just piled up. Every time somebody identified a potential problem, the answer was another law, another regulation, another permit, form or ban. Nobody ever went back and asked whether the old rules still made sense.

The bureaucracy only moves in one direction: more rules, more red tape, more infuriating, inhuman, joyless nonsense. More people telling you no.

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Of course, we need rules against real harm. Nobody wants alcohol served to minors, unsafe food, wildfires, drunk driving or neighborhoods kept awake all night. But those are specific problems. Deal with them specifically.

Instead, the killjoys use the possibility that something might go wrong as an excuse to stop everyone from doing anything. Big companies can hire lawyers and consultants. Independent venues, food vendors, musicians, nonprofits, families and volunteers simply give up.

As governor, I will lead the fightback against the killjoys. I want to help restore the soul and spirit of California. That’s why as governor I will create OFF: a new Office of Fun and Freedom.

OFF will be a small rapid-action team inside the Governor’s Office. It will not be another sprawling department. Its job will be to get rid of rules, not write new ones.

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In its first 100 days, OFF will audit state rules affecting nightlife, community events, food pop-ups, public recreation and social spaces. Every agency will have to explain what specific harm each restriction prevents. If it can’t, we’ll get rid of it.

OFF will create one online front door for state event permits. Agencies will coordinate with each other instead of maddeningly sending people from pillar to post. Routine applications will have firm deadlines, with automatic approval if bureaucrats take too long.

Californians will be able to see how long permits take, what they cost and which agencies are holding people up. We will name and shame the bureaucratic killjoys.

And we’ll tackle the everyday rules that drive people mad.

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A small bar, restaurant or coffee shop should not need a stack of approvals to host a band or let people dance. A volunteer organizing a block party should deal with one application and one deadline, not go on a scavenger hunt through government offices.

Local communities should be able to create late-night zones where qualified venues stay open later, with plans for security, noise and safe rides home. California currently imposes a statewide 2 a.m. cutoff. Why should state politicians decide what works for every neighborhood, town, city?

We should open more state beaches to dogs and provide more designated places for beach fires and family cookouts. Protect wildlife. Require leashes and cleanup. Close fire rings when the danger is high. But stop making a permanent ban the automatic answer to every risk.

The same common sense applies to cannabis. California legalized it. Yet in too many places the result is the smell of weed in parks, on sidewalks and in other public spaces. Give adults legal places to use legal cannabis indoors, in age-restricted, properly ventilated licensed lounges. Local communities can decide whether to allow them.

None of this is trivial. The stupid killjoy rules we have today are emptying downtowns, killing independent businesses and stopping people from spending time together. We spend enough of our lives isolated and stuck to screens. The government should make it easier to get together, not harder.

California does not need another government office telling people what they cannot do. It needs one whose job is to get the killjoy bureaucrats out of the way.

OFF – the Office of Fun and Freedom – will answer the call from Californians up and down our state: Leave us alone to have fun with our friends and families! Leave us alone to enjoy our beautiful state! Leave us alone, to be free!

It is time to restore the rebel spirit of California.